Re: First draft of the "plagiarism" paper.

Alan DeKok wrote:

> "Gordon Fecyk - Home" <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
>>>  I don't care which proposal "wins", or if the final document is
>>>composed mostly of one solution.  I don't have to be here, and I can
>>>always let you work out your differences alone.
>>
>>Therein lies the problem.  Everyone else cares.  Each of us has our own
>>little ambitions, myself included.  And this hasn't been addressed yet.
> 
> 
>   I understand that everyone wants to be listed as "the one person
> that solved the spam problem."
> 
>   It isn't going to happen.  Ever.  Accept that fact, and move on.
> 

I would like to add to this a quote from section 6.2 of the Tao of the 
IETF (RFC 3160):

"6.2 Letting Go Gracefully

The biggest reason some people do not want their documents put on the 
IETF standards track is that they must give up change control of the 
protocol. That is, as soon as you propose that your protocol become an 
IETF standard, you must fully relinquish control of the protocol. If 
there is general agreement, parts of the protocol can be completely 
changed, whole sections can be ripped out, new things can be added, and 
the name can be changed.

Some authors find it very hard to give up control of their pet protocol. 
If you are one of those people, don't even think about trying to get 
your protocol to become an IETF standard. On the other hand, if your 
goal is the best standard possible with the widest implementation, then 
you might find the IETF process to your liking.

Incidentally, the change control on Internet standards doesn't end when 
the protocol is put on the standards track. The protocol itself can be 
changed later for a number of reasons, the most common of which is that 
implementors discover a problem as they implement the standard. These 
later changes are also under the control of the IETF, not the editors of 
the standards document.

IETF standards exist so that people will use them to write Internet 
programs that interoperate. They don't exist to document the (possibly 
wonderful) ideas of their authors, nor do they exist so that a company 
can say "we have an IETF standard." If a standards-track RFC only has 
one implementation (whereas two are required for it to advance on the 
standards track), it was probably a mistake to put it on the standards 
track in the first place."